Agenda and minutes
PDF 52 KBVenue: Town Hall, Bootle
Contact: Paul Fraser Senior Democratic Services Officer Tele: 0151 934 2068
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Election of Chair Minutes: RESOLVED:
That Mrs. Susan Lowe be appointed Chair of the Independent Remuneration Panel for the 2015 -2016 Municipal Year.
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Declarations of Interest Members are requested to give notice of any disclosable pecuniary interest, which is not already included in their Register of Members' Interests and the nature of that interest, relating to any item on the agenda in accordance with the Members Code of Conduct, before leaving the meeting room during the discussion on that particular item.
Minutes: No declarations of any disclosable pecuniary interest were received.
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Minutes of Previous Meeting Minutes of the meeting held on 14 May 2015 Minutes: RESOLVED:
That the Minutes of the meeting held on 14 May 2014 be confirmed as a correct record.
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Special Responsibility Allowances Report of the Head of Governance and Civic Services Minutes: The Panel considered the report of the Head of Governance, Neighbourhoods and Partnerships that indicated that following the Local Government elections in May 2015, the Council had appointed a new Leader of the Council who, in turn, appointed a new Cabinet; that the number of Cabinet Members had increased from the Leader plus 6 to the Leader plus 8 and that the Chair of the Planning Committee was now a Cabinet Member; and that it was noted at the Adjourned Annual Council meeting held on 21 May 2015 that:-
“…it be noted that there will be no additional cost of the above arrangements. The Special Responsibility Allowance (SRA) for Cabinet Members will be adjusted to ensure the new arrangements are cost neutral and the Independent Remuneration Panel is requested to confirm this position.”
Appendix A to the report detailed the current Scheme of Members Allowances based on multiples of the Basic Allowance (BA) to give the levels of SRA for various posts; that in order to meet the requirements that the changes should be cost neutral, the Panel was requested to consider that the BA no longer be the applied multiplier for the Leader and Cabinet posts and that a multiplier of £7,246 be used instead; and that this represented a reduction in the multiplier of 17.6% based on the current BA of £8794.51.
The report concluded by requesting the Panel’s views on the above mentioned reduction (in the multiplier of 17.6% based on the current BA of £8794.51) for submission to the Council meeting on 16 July 2015.
The Panel also considered an email submitted by Councillor Dawson in which he expressed concern that the Panel were being invited to endorse a decision of the Council relating to the amendments to SRA’s rather than the Panel formulating its own decision on the matter; and that he considered that the decision taken by Council to increase the number of Cabinet Members from 7 to 9 was unconstitutional. The email concluded by detailing a number of reasons why Councillor Dawson considered supporting a reduction in the level of Sefton’s SRA’s.
Following questions from Panel Members the Monitoring Officer advised that she was satisfied that the decision taken by Council was neither unlawful nor unconstitutional.
RESOLVED: That:-
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